Building a Suhr killer?

[eythor]

I've been on a Suhr kick lately. I mainly play a Fender CS '64 strat, which I love, but I would like something similar but more modern. HSS, SS jumbo frets, compound radius, etc. Yesterday I went and played a few Suhrs at a local music store: a $6000 Modern, a Classic S and a Pete Thorn signature. I liked the PT the best but didn't really enjoy playing any of them. The Modern I had a while back was better, but I didn't like the HH setup and Floyd. I also tried multiple Music Man Sabres and a PRS Fiore. Same thing. They felt extremely meh. Now, I'm sure a lot of it was down to the setup, but I didn't get that feeling of quality I get with my strat.

This got me thinking, I could build a Warmoth superstrat for A LOT less, and have exactly what I want. I'm not interested in a flame top or anything blingy, so I'm thinking a light weight swamp ash Soloist body with a simple maple/maple warhead neck (22 frets, 6100 SS, 10-16", standard thin) with a tru-oil finish. Pretty much my ideal specs for around $500 total. I already have some locking tuners. I build pickups, so I will make my own HSS set. I'll only have to get a trem.

Something like this:



Has anyone built something similar? I'd love to see pictures. Is the fretwork from Warmoth on par with high end guitars or should I expect to have to put some work into it?

 

[aizenx]

Beautiful concept - love it!

As far as fretwork goes, Warmoth is fantastic and very consistent. However, if you prefer really low action (most likely since you're a Suhr fan), then you'll probably need to do a little bit of level and crowning work. I know a lot of guys that just use their Warmoth's right out of the box without any adjustment to the fretwork, but they also mention that their action isn't super low. Just food for thought.

 

[ruscio]

That sounds like a great project idea. Regarding the frets, someone started a thread over at Strat-Talk about that and there are some useful replies.

 

[Strat Avenger]

My most recent Warmoth project (even though I still need to complete the previous two) is inspired by Suhr guitars.
Warmoth does an excellent job of pressing in the frets, but they do not do fret-leveling. If you want your Warmoth guitar to play like a Suhr, the frets will need to be leveled and dressed by an experienced professional luthier.

 

[stratamania]

Indeed, you will not get the same level of fret work without good professional fret work etc to take it to the standards you are talking about. The post I made, linked below, is probably worth reading and the Welcome to the Forum thread in my signature has various builds etc linked from there with further comment.

What makes a guitar “great”?

I’m curious what this community’s thoughts are on what makes a guitar great? And I’m speaking of bolt-on style guitars, similar to what we would build with Warmoth parts and what some of the other builders over the years have done. Names like Suhr, Anderson, Tyler, Valley Arts, some of the...

unofficialwarmoth.com

 

[Orpheo]

Warmoth is a great blank slate for the future. I discovered that to make a warmoth go from good to absolutely ridiculously amazing, a lot of work has to go in it, like leveling, crowning, polishing frets, doing the fret ends etc. It's fairly OK out of the box but you need to do a lot of work.

 

[Spud]

The materials will all be of comparable quality, but you will have to take it the rest of the way depending on your needs/expectations.

 

[aarontunes]

Warmoth is a great blank slate for the future. I discovered that to make a warmoth go from good to absolutely ridiculously amazing, a lot of work has to go in it, like leveling, crowning, polishing frets, doing the fret ends etc. It's fairly OK out of the box but you need to do a lot of work.

Yep. Warmoth makes world-class parts, but you can't build detailed fretwork and a world-class setup into parts. That stuff is only possible after a guitar is assembled.

 

[Spud]

Also, I am not sure I like all this talk about killing Suhr or anyone else!

 

[stultzies9]

I'll say that Warmoth's raw parts are every bit as good as anything Suhr makes, but like everyone else here has said, what makes that level of guitar what it is is the final setup and fret job. Because Warmoth makes parts and not full guitars, that work still needs to be done to bring the finished guitar to that level. I can say that I have several guitars here that I'll put up against the several Suhrs I've played, but I've also put some money into having that amount of work done to them.

 

[jay4321]

There's no substitute for the finesse work needed to truly complete a guitar, whether the builder does it or someone does.

 

[Strat Avenger]

I'm with Spud. I don't want anyone to kill Suhr.

 

[Spud]

I'm with Spud. I don't want anyone to kill Suhr.